Love is Sacrifice
by badthingswithdamon
Summary: A.U./A.H. - Elena's past comes back to haunt her on the 5th year anniversary of Damon's death.


**_First and Last Meetings_**

_Your breakdown was easy to see_

_And it took you away, further from me  
Sifting through mishaps and photographs  
I think of you, much more than I should  
More than I should_

_And I'm falling down  
Like it's holy ground  
I'm looking for you again  
I'm looking for you again_

_Slow regrets  
That live in the dark  
And I wrote them all down  
But I know them by heart_

_(Matthew Perryman Jones - Looking for you Again)_

* * *

_Dear diary,_

_It's been precisely five years since I saw him for the last time. That day, we yelled at each other and I told him I hated him - He said he didn't care. (I know you did, Damon)_

_Little did I know that, when he went through that door, I had lost him forever, my last memory of him being his back turned on me._

_Not his blue eyes, or his obnoxious smile, or even the taste of his lips, but the sight of his back and the loud sound of the door closing. _

_At first I couldn't believe that he could possibly be dead. There was no way that would happen, it wasn't meant to end like this. No, he had to be alive somewhere. For weeks, I still hoped that he would come back to me some day. I didn't let myself mourn him. Faith inevitably ended and a couple of months later I finally realised that he was not coming back. Ever._

_I've regretted the choice I made ever since - I should have chosen him. (I should have chosen _**_you_**_) I should have prevented him from leaving, I should have held him from behind and never let him go. I should have told him the truth ... That no, I didn't hate him - I loved him. _

_Scratch that, I _**_love_**_ him. _

_(Stefan and I may be soulmates, as Caroline says, but Damon's soul and mine are the same)_

_I always had and I always will, and moving on when I know I'm the reason he's gone (dead!) is just another lost effort._

_If there is one thing I've learned over the past five years is that when someone dies, they stay dead. I just can't learn to live with the fact that so many people I love are staying dead. _

* * *

Elena closed her diary and, as the middle pages hit one another, a picture fell from it. She couldn't prevent a sad smile from forming on her lips when she saw it and, before placing it back between the pages of the journal, she let her fingers tenderly touch the man on the photo.

He had raven hair and the most piercing blue eyes, which rested on the face of a relatively smaller, considerably younger girl. Along with all of that, he was sporting his characteristic smirk, the one that used to annoy her and that now only brought her nostalgia and an heartache.

What she was holding was the only photograph she had either of and with Damon Salvatore. Yes, she could simply ask Stefan if he had some he would be willing to spare, but they wouldn't be hers. That one, however, was hers and hers alone. Nobody else had seen it, nobody else in the world knew it even existed.

She could still recall that day, when Damon had insisted they should have a picture taken. After a small amount of time, she finally agreed with being photographed with him. Even back then, when she was still head over heels in love with Stefan, it was so obvious she couldn't resist Damon. He had a way of getting inside of her, of knowing her better than anyone. Also, Damon would always get what he wanted, using his incredible techniques of persuasion that relied on his charming and blunt manner of wording his thoughts.

She came back to surface from the depths of her memories. Nothing good ever came from dwelling on past memories, especially those regarding Damon. She glanced one more time at the picture, letting a wishful sigh escape from her mouth.

In that precise moment, she heard the doorknob turning and put the diary away as fast as she could. The tall blonde glanced at Elena, her eyes simultaneously showing sympathy for what her best friend was going through and determination on cheering her up.

"Why are you still in bed, Elena? Get up! _Now_! Today we have important issues to deal with." Caroline quickly reached the wardrobe, rummaging through Elena's clothes.

"I've already told you I'm not really in mood for shopping, Care." Elena stated, not moving from her position on bed "Please, just don't bother me today and I promise I'll go to your company's beneficence event tomorrow ..."

"Seriously? This is not about some stupid event, Elena!" she flipped "I can't deal with you being this way for three years straight. You have to get over it and stop that mourning ritual of becoming deeply depressed on Damon's ... I mean... You only knew him for like one year, it doesn't make sense for you to mourn him for this long."

Elena didn't even bother to answer - Caroline wouldn't get it anyway. She thought that Damon had been just a close friend during all that time they'd spent together. She had no idea of how her relationship with the older Salvatore had been far from platonic, how he was passionate and kind, and made her feel as anything in the world could be possible when she was in his arms and he was on hers. No one knew.

"Uh ... Sorry, Elena, I ... I didn't mean it to come out this way it's just ... It hurts me to see you hurting yourself whenever you think about him. It was not your fault."

But it was, wasn't it? If he hadn't involved himself on that case, if he didn't help her, if she had insisted that she didn't need him to do put himself in danger for her, he would still be there. Elena Gilbert, on her self-centred selfless world, always thought everyone's misfortune was her fault.

"Fine." she lied, putting on a fake smile "I guess I do need to clear my head and what better way than spending the day with a control-freak blonde?"

"I'm not a control-freak!" the other glared at her with disbelief "Okay ... maybe a little. But, you know what? Forget shopping, let's stay here."

"Caroline Forbes, telling me that she would rather stay home than go out and buy clothes! What's going on with the world? Call the media!"

"You can be so annoying sometimes, Elena. But ... yeah! Let's just stay here, in your bed, making life choices we'll regret tomorrow, like eating loads of ice cream and watching _The Notebook._"

"_The Notebook_?" Elena cried "Again? Caroline ..."

"What better way to deal with emotional problems than by watching _The Notebook_?"

"Is that what you do when you fight with Tyler?"

"Low blow, Gilbert." Caroline frowned, joining her friend on bed and picking up the laptop that until now rested by Elena's feet "Let's not talk about boys today, especially not Tyler."

"Did anything happen? Last time I talked to you, which was yesterday by the way, you were telling me all the details of your june wedding."

"That's precisely the problem! Nothing happened! We've been together for five years but he never talks about our future together. It was our anniversary yesterday, I was expecting him to ask me in marriage after our date. I doubt he even wants to marry me, that's why it is taking so long for him to ask! You know, his mom totally doesn't like me. She's my boss, it's her job not to like me and make my life miserable ..."

Elena rolled her eyes.

"Caroline ... You're 23! You have plenty of time to think about marriage! Don't rush it."

Caroline continued to speak a lot of nonsense, like how she was going to end up alone, knitting while living in a house with thirty five cats. Once Elena started playing the movie, it didn't take much longer for Caroline to forget the marriage issue and focus it while saying all her favourite lines by heart. Elena tried to do the same, except for that one last part, but while her eyes wouldn't give it away, her mind was far from the movie. _It all started on a rainy day. _

* * *

_Fear moves us. It makes us cry and run and do horrible things. It makes us avoid love because we know every single thing will eventually come to an end. We don't want to get hurt. The best way to avoid is is to not feel at all. In order to dominate fear you must not love, for fear implies love and love implies fear. _

_Elena learned this the hard way. Most of the time she wished she could just stop being afraid that, one day, everyone she loved would go away and she would be left to rot alone until the day Death would finally come for her. Some other times she wished Death would simply come sooner. _

_Mom and Dad were gone. Jeremy was losing himself to drugs. She wouldn't be with all her friends - Caroline, Bonnie, Matt ... - forever. Stefan would eventually leave her if she didn't leave him first. Time doesn't stop for anyone and Elena sure was afraid of time. _

_If she'd only had some more time with them ... If only she could have held them for just a little longer ... Tell her mother she loved her one last time. Give her father one last peck in the cheek. _

_Every single day for the last couple months she would go to the graveyard and take care of the flowers on her parents grave. Talking to them, even though she knew they couldn't possibly hear her, made her feel closer to them. _

_She couldn't tell when it begun to rain. First, she just let the tiny raindrops fall on her, caressing her bare skin and giving her a unexpected sense of peace. Her eyes were now closed while she relished the moment, her back resting on a marble statue that was nearby, her legs falling to the ground. _

_"Despite the fact that I love to see girls getting wet, I don't think you should be sitting in the rain while wearing a summer dress." _

_His voice echoed in her mind, making her realise the situation she was in. Her eyes opened and looked up to see a man in a leather jacket who was smiling at her while having no idea of what was going on. She didn't know what to say as she didn't expect for anyone to be at the graveyard this early in the morning. She wasn't prepared for any kind of human interaction. _

_"Okay so I guess either you're mute or the spirits took your ability to talk" the man sat by her side and for some moments he seemed to appreciate that moment filled with silence and the scent of the earth blending with the rain "The name's Damon, by the way. Damon Salvatore." _

_Elena turned her head to her right, facing the other's face. It was the first time she looked into his eyes. He raised an eyebrow while waiting for her to say something but she still couldn't process it all. _

_"Aren't you going to tell me yours? That's pretty rude, you know ..."_

_"Salvatore? As in ... Stefan Salvatore?" she asked, finally being able to put things together, regaining her ability to join coherent words. _

_"Yup. He's my little brother, why, do you go to kindergarten together?" _

_She chuckled, making a surprised smile appear on Damon's lips, while he looked fascinated at the now considerably soaked girl. _

_"You could say so. I'm his girlfriend, Elena." _

_"Oh, I've heard of you." he said, standing up and then offering her his hand "But judging by the look in your face, the same couldn't be said about me."_

_"Yeah ..." she dragged her voice while accepting his help "Neither Stefan or your father ever told me about you. It's weird."_

_"Of course not, they were afraid that if you met me you would fall in love with me. I get it. I'm pretty much irresistible."_

_His flirtatious wink at the end made her genuinely laugh, something that she hadn't done in a while. _

_"I'm not even going to say anything. But tell me, what makes Damon Salvatore wander in graveyards? Maybe looking for his next kill?" asked Elena with a playful smile on her lips. _

_"You could say so." he joked "Actually, I'm visiting my mother. I haven't been in Mystic Falls for eight years now." _

_She was silent for some seconds, telling herself that it was such a stupid question. Of course he was visiting her mother's grave. Stefan's mother was dead, for god's sake, she knew that. _

_"That was kind of when I met Stefan. Eight years ago, I mean." she replied, her smile now sadder, more nostalgic while she remembered the time when a sweet green eyed boy knocked on her door and her mom made them cookies. _

_"Now it's my turn. Why are you here?"_

_"I'm visiting my parents." _

_"On a Saturday morning?"_

_"I've been doing this every saturday since they died, two months ago." _

_For the first time, the man's smile was far from mischievous. _

_"It makes us feel closer to them, right? Talking as if they were still here. I did that for a while until I turned sixteen. Then I stopped even coming, telling myself I'd moved on." _

_"Stefan never told me much about your mother. There's no photographs at the boarding house. Sometimes I've wondered if she even existed at all."_

_"Stefan was very young, I doubt that he even remembers her." he put his harm around Elena, pulling her in direction to his car "Now, you're soaking wet. Little brother will kill me if he finds out I let his girlfriend get sick. We gotta go, sweetheart. I'll give you a ride." _

_"And how do you know I don't have a car?" she asked. _

_"Wait? You're old enough to drive? I thought you were fifteen!" Damon opened the door "There's no car on the surroundings. I guessed." _

* * *

The movie was almost ending and Caroline had been sobbing like she had lost her dog, packets and packets of tissues piling up around her for at least half an hour. She was so invested on her sadness that she didn't even notice her friend falling asleep half way through the movie and, honestly, Elena was thankful for that.

Her brown eyes only opened with the sound of Caroline's ringtone, Bonnie's name showing up on the screen.

"Is something wrong, Bonnie?" she muttered, her phone on her shoulder while she turned off the movie "WHAT?"

Caroline tossed the phone away, making so that it ended up on the edge of the bed. She rose up almost instantly, leaving behind a very confused Elena. She started mumbling a lot of nonsense, walking around the room in a typically Caroline-ish panic attack. Elena let her be for a couple of minutes, speaking up when her friend started to calm down.

"So, are you going to tell me what happened?"

"My boss loves to ruin my life! Klaus is back in town and it seems Mrs. Lockwood invited him to the event."

Something inside Elena trembled with Caroline's words. Her pounding heart was going to burst out of her chest and her lungs were desperately asking for more air.

She hoped it would be many years before she had to see that man's face ever again as he told her not to expect him any day soon. Well, she should've guessed it though - Klaus loves to do the unexpected.

* * *

**A.N.: Thanks for reading it until here! This is my first time trying to write fanfiction in english (and my first time for The Vampire Diaries) so please don't be too harsh (but I do need you to be harsh!) **

**I really really need a beta as I'm not a native speaker and so my sentences are really awkward phrased. **


End file.
